Gumdrop Christmas Tree Ornament

I’ll never forget the little Christmas tree that stood in my kitchen the year of 2002.

{This coming from someone who can rarely remember what she had for lunch!?}

I found the perfect tree at a yard sale for $4. Basically, it was the perfect tree because it was $4.

I tied bows to all of my cookie cutters and used them as ornaments…

…I gathered sticks from the yard and added gumdrops to the ends.

I stuck the gumdrop branches all over the tree to cover the bare spots.

It was the perfect kitchen Christmas tree.

That was also the year that Anna Belle was 1 and had just started toddling through the house.

A few days into the perfect kitchen Christmas tree going up, I began to notice sticky spots on the floor all around the tree.

I just chalked it up to the fact that I had a 3 year old and 1 year old and most things in my house were sticky. 🙂

A few days later I began to notice that many of the gumdrops were not sugary, but shiny.

It was then that I realized what was happening.

So that afternoon I followed Anna Belle as she toddled to the kitchen…walked up to the gumdrop branch… and stood there until she had sucked all of the sugar off of a gumdrop as she drooled all over my floor.

I had totally forgotten this sweet memory until Anna Belle and I were making these ornaments together.

She said, “You know, I don’t really like the way gumdrops taste. I just like to suck the sugar off of them.”

And I immediately looked at that 12 year old girl and saw that little toddler standing at the tree drooling all over my floor.

What sweet memories. 🙂

Here is how to make a gumdrop Christmas ornament:

Supplies:

Rectangular Wooden Plaque painted white

10 Gumdrops

1 Wooden Star

Decorative Paper

Ribbon for the Hanger

Brown Grosgrain Ribbon

Decoupage

Hot Glue

Cut paper and decoupage to the plaque.

Use hot glue to add the star to the top,

and build your tree from the top down.

Add ribbon for the trunk.

Attach ribbon to the back of the plaque with hot glue to make a hanger.

Anna Belle and I had the best time making these ornaments.

And, an even better time sharing the story of the perfect kitchen Christmas tree of 2002.

7 Comments

JaneEllen - November 19, 2013

Do you like gum drops? Don’t know if I do or not but they look great on that ornament, awesome post.
This is so blasted cute, love it all to heck and back. Really loved story of the gum drops on the tree, so cute and what a wonderful memory for you two to share. Did you remember what year by old she was? That’s how I know what years things happened by how old my kids were. Happy days